The Jenny Lewis Chronicles Ep 3
by MrandMrsTemple
Summary: Jenny and the gang face their first future creature when a giant futuristic sea star appears in Richmond Park Pond. With communications cut by a storm, can Jenny and the gang tackle the future on their own? Sorry for the summary, the story is much better.
1. Chapter 1

The Jenny Lewis Chronicles

Episode 3

Chapter 1

The elderly lady shuffled towards the duck pond in Richmond Park. She lived on her own, her husband had passed away and her children were all grown up, so now the most exciting thing she had to do in her life was feed the ducks every morning.

As she neared the shore of the pond, she reached into her bag and broke the bread she had brought into small pieces. As she was going to throw them in, she noticed something strange. Normally there were loads of ducks and geese on the pond, today though there were only three ducks, two geese and a coot, and it wasn't even winter yet.

Still, the old woman didn't bother herself with that, she threw her piece of bread far out into the centre of the pond. Surprisingly though, none of the birds seemed willing to follow, indeed they seemed to want to stick near the shore of the pond, in the shallow water. So the bread sank to the bottom, then the old woman threw another piece, again they would not follow. BUt then she threw a third piece of bread and this time, the coot's hunger got the better of him, he shot out into the middle of the pond and gobbled up the bread before it could sink. The old woman, pleased that the birds were finally beginning to respond, continued to throw bread out there. One by one, the ducks and geese all headed out into the centre of the pond and were soon stuffing themselves with the bread.

But when the old woman had thrown her last piece if bread, the ducks, geese and coot suddenly remembered that they were out in the middle of the pond and started honking and quacking with alarm. Soon, the old woman saw why. The water around the birds began to swirl, slowly at first, but then more violently, until there was a fully fledged whirlpool right in the middle of the duck pond. The ducks, geese and coot were sent spinning around, squawking with horror as they realised their fate. One by one they were all sucked down into the centre of the whirlpool, which then stopped as oddly as it had come into existence.

For a moment, the old woman stood where she was, completely bewildered. Then suddenly, a patch of water in the centre of the pond began to bubble and froth, the patch moved slowly towards the old woman, before coming to a halt just a couple of feet away from the pond shore. For a moment, the bubbling patch of water stayed where it was. Then, something began to emerge from it.

The old woman screamed and ran back to her car as fast as her elderly legs could carry her. She had just seen an large, orange eyeball emerging from the bubbles.


	2. Chapter 2

The Jenny Lewis Chronicles

Episode 3

Chapter 2

Mike Bolton sat at the kitchen table looking over the medical records of a golden retriever, although his thoughts were mainly on his daughter, Tracy. Since his divorce, Tracy had largely become quite withdrawn and silent. Thankfully though, following her meeting of their new neighbour, Jenny Lewis, she was now returning to her previous self. However, she was still quite secretive about what she got up to with Jenny and that boy, Harry. All the same, Mike didn't like to be nosy and he decided that for the time being at least, he would keep his inquiries to himself.

Just then, Tracy came downstairs, fully dressed.

"Are you going out then?" asked Mike.

"Yeah, I'm going over the road to see Jenny" replied Tracy.

"Oh yeah" said Mike, "I don't know, I reckon you must spend more time over there than you do here. Trying to forget about me are you?"

"Oh shut up Dad" giggled Tracy as she left.

* * * * * *

As Tracy crossed over the road, she began to have thoughts about her dad, and about what she did. It was quite dangerous, fighting raptors, running from giant snakes. But then again, Jenny had told her that no matter what, she was never to tell anyone about what they did with the anomalies,and that when she was on the anomaly team, they were never allowed to tell anyone outside of the team what they did, not even family. So because Tracy was a law abiding citizen, she had not and would not tell her dad about this.

As she entered Jenny's driveway, she saw her and Harry exiting the house.

"Oh, hi Tracy" they said in unison.

"Hi, so anything up today?" asked Tracy.

"Yes" said Jenny, "There's a new anomaly down at the park, if you'd like to come."

Tracy smiled and nodded. Jenny pointed up at the darkening sky.

"You might want to pack an umbrella, though."


	3. Chapter 3

The Jenny Lewis Chronicles

Episode 3

Chapter 3

Jenny rounded the corner into Richmond Park, only to find the layby near the park gates occupied.

"Oh damn" whispered Jenny. She peered through the windshield into the parked car, there she could see an mess of graying hair, trembling like a leaf.

"It's an old lady" said Jenny, she honked the horn once, but still nothing happened. She sighed and turned to the back seat.

"Could you two please get out and politely ask the old lady in front to move her car?"

"Yeah alright" said Tracy and Harry in unison as they got out the car. They headed towards the layby and peeked through the window. Inside, they saw the old lady curled up into a ball, cowering and shaking with fear. Somewhat nervously, Harry gently rapped on the window. The old woman screamed and peered out of the window with saucer-eyes filled with fear. Then she saw the two children and calmed down.

"Well, is she going to move?" asked Jenny. Tracy and Harry turned towards her.

"Actually by the look of things, I think it's going to take more than a simple request to get her to move" said Harry.

* * * * * *

Five minutes later, the old woman was sitting on the park bench, Tracy, Harry and Jenny sat on either side of her. She was still shaking and every so often, she threw nervous glances at the pond.

"So, what's your name?" asked Jenny softly.

"B-barbara Jerome" stammered the old woman.

"Right well, can you tell us what exactly you saw, Barbara" asked Jenny.

Barbara took out a hankerchief and wiped her nose, she took one last nervous look at the pond before beginning her tale.

"It was around eight this morning" she began. "I was just going to feed the ducks like I've always done since my youngest daughter left home. Only when I got here, there were only about six ducks here and usually there are lots more."

"What happened after that?" asked Tracy.

"Well, when I first started throwing the bread out into the middle of the pond, they wouldn't follow it, it was like they were scared to go to the middle. Anyway eventually, they did and that's when it happened."

"What happened?" asked Jenny.

"There was this sort of whirlpool like thing" said Barbara, wiping her nose as she spoke. "Oh it was awful, they all got sucked down one by one. And then there were the bubbles."

"What bubbles?" asked Harry.

"There was this sort of patch of bubbles coming from the middle of the pond, I didn't know what to make of them. But then, they started moving towards me, and that's when I saw..." she paused for a moment before whispering five terrified words, "A great, big, orange eyeball."

At this point, Barbara started sobbing into her hankerchief, Jenny rubbed her back reassuringly. Then Barbara wiped her eyes and continued.

"But that wasn't the worst part. The worst part came as I was heading back to my car. I looked behind me, and I saw this...thing coming after me. I don't know how I could possibly describe it to you. It was green and slimy and it had a sort of star shape about it. It was running after me a bit like a gorilla. And as I got in the car, it threw itself at the window, I could see that it was trying to get in and eat me."

She whimpered for a bit before going on once more.

"Then all of a sudden, it started coughing and spluttering, and it ran back to the pond as fast as it could go."

She sighed a long deep sigh, then she turned to Jenny and the children.

"What are you going to do?" she asked.

Jenny stood up and looked at Tracy and Harry.

"You two stay here and look for anything suspicious. I'm going to take Barbara home."

And with that, she head slowly back to Barbara's car, the old lady shuffling alongside her. Meanwhile, Tracy and Harry started towards the pond.

"So, do you think it's another creature?" said Harry.

"Of course, Harry" said Tracy playfully. "I mean, how many modern day things have great big orange eyeballs like the one Barbara just talked about?"

"Would it be inappropriate for me the say the Eye of Sauron?" asked Harry.


	4. Chapter 4

The Jenny Lewis Chronicles

Episode 3

Chapter 4

Tracy and Harry sat on the bench on the banks of the pond. They had skirted the edges three times now, scanning the water for anything suspiscous. Unfortunately, the water was too dark and clouded to see anything, not even the glowing of the anomaly. After failing to find either a creature or an anomaly in the pond, Tracy and Harry had gone to look for it in the forest nearby. However, they were unable to go far because of Jenny's orders to stay put.

So here they were now, waiting for Jenny to return. She did seem to be taking her time and naturally, the children soon became bored. Tracy twiddled her thumbs, meanwhile Harry paced up and down the edge of the pond. Finally though, he stopped and bent down to pick something up.

"Found something?" called Tracy.

"Yeah" said Harry, producing a small, flat stone, "A skimming stone!" And before Tracy could stop him, he hurled it across the pond with all his might. The stone bounced once, twice, thrice, four times before sinking to the bottom of the pond.

Tracy held her breath. The reason she did not want Harry to skim the stone was because she was sure it would disturb whatever might still be in the pond. Moments later, her fears were confirmed by a frothing patch of bubbles, similar to the one Barbara had described.

"Oh nice going, Harry" she snapped.

"What?" said Harry defensively.

Before Tracy could come up with another arguement, the patch of bubbles in the centre of the pond started moving towards them. The two children stepped back as it reached the edge of the pond. For a moment it remained where it was. Then slowly, like excalibur rising from the lake, the orange eyeball emerged from the bubbles and regarded Tracy and Harry angrily.

Then all of a sudden, a long, flat tentacle exploded from the water. The top was smooth, green, and considerably slimy, meanwhile the bottom was covered in an bubbling mass of translucent tube feet, like elongated suckers moving in and out. Tracy could easily imagine one of them fixing itself to her face. The end of the tentacle was curled up, as if it was holding something. Suddenly it hurled the item it was holding directly at Harry and Tracy. The two children ducked just in time, Harry's skimming stone just brushed their hair as it flew over.

Then something even worse happened. The tentacle flopped downwards, the tube feet attached themselves to the bank, and before long, the creature had dragged itself out of the pond altogether. It was star shaped, just as Barabara had described it, and it now became obvious to Tracy and Harry that the tentcale that had dragged it out of the pond was being used more like a elephant's trunk. In the centre of the star was the single eyeball, the look in it had changed from one of anger to one of hunger.

Petrified, Tracy and Harry watched as the creature slowly but surely rose up on four arms. The two that were on opposite sides of the trunk curled up at the end, so it looked like the creature was going up on its knuckles, like a gorilla. Meanwhile, the tube feet on the bottom half of the back arms were attaching themselves to the bank, allowing for the creature to raise itself up even further. As soon as it had righted itself, it threw back its 'trunk' and roared, revealing a mouth with at least six rows of sharp teeth.

"Run!" cried Tracy. She and Harry turned and ran back towards the road. The creature roared and ran after them with deceptive speed on its front tentacles, with its back ones trailing behind it. Its trunk like tentacle was held up above it.

Tracy and Harry dashed over the road and looked back at their pursuer. It was still coming after them, it had almost reached the pavement, soon it was coming across the road. It reached out with its trunk towards Harry.

Suddenly it was knocked sideways and a car appeared right in front of Tracy and Harry's eyes. Jenny got out, brandishing her pistol.

"Get back, both of you." she barked, "Get behind me."

Tracy and Harry did as they were told. Jenny cocked her pistol and aimed it at the creature, which was now lying on its back in the middle of the road, its tube feet writhing as they tried to right their owner. Eventually they succeeded and the creature continued on its way towards the three humans. Once more, it stretched its trunk out, this time attempting to grab Jenny, the human who had knocked it over.

Suddenly it drew back its trunk and started coughing and making rather unpleasant wheezing noises. It took one last angry glance at its would be prey and started half slithering, half galloping back towards the edge of the pond. Once there, it leapt off the bank and landed with an almighty splash in the water.

"What just happened?" said Tracy.

Jenny lowered her pistol.

"I think it just ran out of breath."


	5. Chapter 5

The Jenny Lewis Chronicles

Episode 3

Chapter 5

"What was that thing?" said Tracy in the car on the way home.

"Personally" said Harry, "I'd say it was some sort of starfish, judging by those tube feet and that more obvious star shape it had."

"Is it prehistoric?" said Tracy.

"No!" said Jenny, speaking up for the first time since they'd gotten back in the car. "It's futuristic!"

"How do you know that?" asked Harry. "I've seen your future files on your laptop and there's no animal like that. I mean sure there's a wierd mermaid-monkey thing but that's the only water animal in that file."

Jenny turned to him.

"Harry, I have been dealing with anomalies for much longer than you have, I have seen plenty of future creatures in my time, I think I'd know one when I saw it."

"Sorry" said Harry, hanging his head.

"It's alright" said Jenny as they pulled into her driveway on Revenue Street.

"What about the anomaly?" asked Tracy as they got out. "Do you think the sea star will go back through it?"

"I wish I could say yes" replied Jenny, looking at her anomaly detector. "But unfortunately, future creatures are very unpredictable and in any event, the anomaly's closed now."

"So what do we do?"

Jenny turned to her. "This is too big for us, Tracy. In my experience, future creatures are extremley dangerous. We're going to have to call the anomaly team and ask them to come and deal with it."

As they went into the house, an enormous clap of thunder sounded above their heads. A storm was close.

* * * * * *

At the bottom of the pond, the future sea star lay spread out in its entirety.

It was hungry. In its home era of the future, it lived near coral reefs feeding on giant clams. And on days when there were no giant clams, it would suction feed. This was a process where it would lift up its trunk and suck in the water around it. As it did so, it created a whirpool so that any fish unlucky enough to be near it would be sucked into its mouth, along with any equally unlucky seabirds who might on the surface.

Right now, the sea star would have like nothing better than to go home and treat itself to a giant clam. Alas, its anomaly had closed just as it had re-entered the pond after attempting to hunt those three humans. Here in this dingy, smelly pond, there was insufficient food for it. Sure it had found ducks and geese to be tasty, but they were only light snacks for the sea star. There were no large fish to eat and there certainly weren't any giant clams. So the sea star was having to go hungry.

Suddenly it heard a great rumbling coming from the surface. It was a familiar sound. The sea star immediately headed for the shallows, where it could easily peer out of the water, a patch of bubbles on the surface betrayed its whereabouts. As it reached the shallows, the sea star rose up on all five of its long appendages, including the trunk. As its single eyeball exited the bubble patch, it saw a familiar sight: a blackening sky filled with rolling clouds.

If future sea stars could smile, this one would do so right now. It remembered the mischief it had gotten up to on land in its youth on days like this. Soon, it would be able to do it again, soon it would be time to leave the pond and go hunting.


	6. Chapter 6

The Jenny Lewis Chronicles

Episode 3

Chapter 6

Jenny hung up her coat by the door and then, to Tracy and Harry's surprise, went straight into the kitchen.

"I thought you were going to call the anomaly team!" cried Tracy.

"I am, Tracy, but everyone needs a nice cup of tea once in a while" said Jenny as she boiled the kettle.

For about five minutes, Tracy and Harry waited impatiently in the living room. Meanwhile, the storm outside went from bad to worse as rain lashed against the windows and ear splitting claps of thunder sounded.

Finally though, Jenny returned from the kitchen with a steaming cup of tea. After taking a quick sip from it, she headed over to her phone.

Just as she was reaching for it though, there was an almighty clap of thunder outside, followed by the crackling of lightning. Instantly, the light in the living room went out. Jenny switched on the TV, hoping that what she thought had just happened hadn't. But nothing happened when she tried to turn it on, there was a power cut.

"Oh this is just fantastic isn't it?" groaned Jenny sarcastically. "We get a future creature on the loose and the next thing we know there's a power cut."

"Here" said Tracy, passing Jenny her mobile, "Use this!"

Jenny smiled as she switched the phone on, only for her mouth to droop once more when she did.

"You haven't charged this phone up lately, have you, Tracy?"

Tracy took her phone back from Jenny, she groaned when she saw that it was completely flat.

"So now what do we do?"

"Well" said Jenny, "The team can't help us, so we're just going to have to deal with this ourselves." She turned to Tracy and Harry. "Pack an umbrella you two, it's time to go back to the park!"


	7. Chapter 7

The Jenny Lewis Chronicles

Episode 3

Chapter 7

To Tracy and Harry's surprise, rather than heading straight for the park, Jenny instead headed into town and parked her car in the car park of the local Waitrose.

"I thought we were going to stop a sea star from the future, not go shopping!" cried Harry.

"We are" said Jenny, "I just need to buy a little something first, you two stay here."

She got out the car and headed for the shop. Tracy and Harry watched as she dissapeared behind the sliding doors and returned a few minutes later with something wrapped in a bundle of newspapers. She opened the back door of the car and handed it to Harry, instantly an awful, fishy smell filled the car. Tracy gagged and rolled down her window, Harry stared at it in disgust and tried to supress the feeling of nausea he was currently having. Gingerly, he opened the newspaper parcel and found it to contain what must have been a very old halibut, its glassy dead eyes staring up at him in a melancholy way.

"What's that for?" gasped Tracy, holding a tissue over her nose.

"With any luck, it'll be for luring the sea star somewhere where we can contain it" said Jenny.

"But don't sea stars usually eat shellfish?" said Harry.

"Yes" replied Jenny, "But some species also eat dead animals that they find on the seabed. Hopefully, that sea star in the pond is desended from that kind."

As soon as she said that, there came a gurgling roar from nearby. Jenny screeched to a halt and looked in the direction it had come from. There was a scream and a gang of teenage chavs dashed out of a nearby alleyway. A dustbin was hurled after them and the future sea star oozed around the corner.

"I don't think its in the pond anymore, Jenny" said Tracy nervously.

"Harry" said Jenny, "Take that fish out of the newspaper!"

"What?"

"Just do it!" barked Jenny.

Reluctantly, Harry held the halibut by its tail and peeled the newspapers off it.

"Now hold it out the window" said Jenny.

Harry did as he was told. Jenny stamped down on the acceleration pedal and shot forward towards the sea star. When it saw her coming, it gurgled with fear and stepped out of the way of the car. But then, it caught a whiff of the smelly halibut that Harry was dangling out the window. Its stomach rumbled and it reached with its trunk towards the fish. Jenny saw this in the rear view mirror and soon the car was zooming away. Infuriated, the sea star bellowed and half slithered half galloped after the car.

* * * * * *

For a while, Jenny lead the sea star on, constantly checking the rear view mirror to see how far behind it was. Unfortunately, each time she looked, it was no further away than it was the last time, at the very least it was showing no signs of giving up.

"I don't get it" said Tracy. "Shouldn't it be suffocating right now?"

Jenny didn't answer but instead looked straight at her windshield, at the rain that was running down it in gallons. Then the answer came to her.

"Under ordinary circumstances, yes, it should be suffocating now." said Jenny. "But I think that all of this rain is allowing it to breathe on land for longer than last time. It must be acting as a sort of artificial sea for it."

Tracy looked back at the sea star. Now that Jenny had mentioned it, the sea star seemed to be having no trouble breathing on land in the storm. She looked up at the sky, from the looks of things, the rain wasn't going to let up at any time soon.

"So what, are we just going to let it chase us around until it stops raining?"

Jenny looked up at the black rain clouds before answering.

"No" she said bluntly.

Without warning, she suddenly turned the car around so violently that Harry almost dropped the fish he was holding. No sooner had Jenny done that, she stamped down on the acceleration pedal and zoomed straight towards the sea star. The creature barely had time to raise its two front arms in front of its face before the car smacked into it. The sea star was thrown forwards by the impact, it somersaulted across the car roof and landed on the tarmac sucker side up. However, thanks to its tube feet, it was quickly able to right itself and set off after the car once more.

"Where are we going now?" asked Tracy.

"Home!" said Jenny.


	8. Chapter 8

The Jenny Lewis Chronicles

Episode 3

Chapter 8

Tyres screeching aginst the wet road, Jenny pulled into her driveway on Revenue Street, before letting Tracy and Harry out.

"Now what?' cried Harry, eager to be rid of the putrid halibut.

Jenny didn't answer but instead walked out of her driveway and stared down the road. There, coming around the corner, was the future sea star.

"Get inside, both of you!" cried Jenny as she tottered back to the house in her high heels.

"What about this?" said Harry, holding out the halibut at arms length.

"Keep hold of it!" said Jenny as she dashed past him into the house. As they entered the hall, she turned around to face the door, which she had left open, apparently on purpose.

"Get behind me, Tracy. Harry you stay in front."

Harry was just about to ask why when he caught another unwanted whiff of the fish he held in his hand. Understanding what he needed to do, he turned back towards the door, which the sea star was slithering slowly towards.

"As soon as I say so, throw that fish directly at the sea star" whispered Jenny.

"Ok" said Harry, never taking his eyes off the sea star as it slithered through the door and into the hallway. As it oozed closer to the three humans, its trunk reached out towards the fish in Harry's hand.

"Now!" hissed Jenny.

Harry didn't need to be told twice. He hurled the stinking halibut straight towards the sea star. It raised its trunk and caught it in mid air before stuffing it in its hidden mouth. Then, its hunger far from sated, it continued towards the three humans standing in front of it.

"Wait for it, wait for it" whispered Jenny as the the sea star's trunk reached towards them.

Suddenly, a horrible choking noise escaped the sea star and it immediately withdrew its trunk and curled it inwards. Coughing and spluttering, its single eyeball began searching out a way back to water. It saw the open door and made for it, but Tracy got there first and slammed it shut. Wheezing with fury, the sea star placed one arm against the wall to stabilise it, before it raised itself up on to its back tentacles. With a gurgling snarl its reached with its trunk towards Tracy. But before it could grab her, it gave a long drawn out wheeze and collapsed, it gave several more pathetic wheezes before it was silenced forever.


	9. Chapter 9

The Jenny Lewis Chronicles

Episode 3

Chapter 9

Tracy sat down on the sofa in Jenny's living room. Outside in the hallway, the sea star lay covered by a tarpaulin, waiting for the anomaly team to come and pick it up. Now that the power had returned Jenny was able to give them a call and now they were on their way.

"Well, I'm glad that that's sorted" said Jenny as she came into the living room. She saw Tracy sitting on the sofa, looking slightly down.

"Hey, what's wrong?"

"I'm just thinking about what I did back there" said Tracy. "Shutting the door on that sea star, I murdered it! I mean I know that you say that future creatures are really dangerous but still."

Jenny put her arm around Tracy.

"I know how you feel Tracy. I remember when I was on the anomaly team, we faced situations like that all the time. We didn't nessecarily want to kill the creatures that came through the anomalies, but the fact was , sometimes we had to. If we hadn't, then people would probably have been killed for it. You did the right thing, Tracy."

Then from outside, a door opened and closed as Harry exited the toilet. He had just spent the last ten minutes trying to wash the horrible fishy smell off his hands.

"Well. how is it?" asked Jenny.

"It's finally gone" said Harry with relief. "I don't know about you two but personally, I never want to see another fish as long as I live!" Then he slapped his forehead. "Oh, no."

"What's wrong?" asked Tracy.

"I've just remembered what my mum's cooking for dinner tonight: fish fingers!"

"Well that's not a problem" said Jenny, pointing at Harry's hand. "Just tell her you've already had five!"


End file.
